The Internet suffers from problems like malware, spam, viruses, worms, and DDoS attacks.
Any part of a computer under the control of a user can be appropriated by malware when a user installs software on the computer. Often the appropriation of the computer is imperceptible to the user of the computer.
Dell™ notes that 20% of all customer care calls are due to malware, and average $30 per call. Corporate losses due to malware are in the billions of Dollars. About 80% of all corporations have reported infiltrations of their corporate network by malware or spyware. A single personal computer infected with spyware takes an IT department anywhere from two hours to many days to repair. The cost of associated with spam has risen from $10 billion in 2003 to an estimated $22 billion in 2005.
In September, 2004 about 30,000 personal computers per day were infected with or participated in the infection of other computers with malware, spam, spyware, or were subjected to or participated in DDoS attacks.
Many entities are well suited to discover and diagnose spam, viruses, worms and DDoS attacks. Examples of these entities are AOL, MSN, Comcast, McAfee, AT&T and MCI. The goal of the embodiments of this invention is to allow these well suited entities to administer the security on personal computers through knowledge gained running their vast networks.
There is a need for a system that can adapt to new threats, that cannot be by-passed by the user of the user operating system, and that also prevents threats from reaching critical components of a user operating system.
The present embodiments meet these needs.